On Saturday, 11th of April, because of the consequences of the long illness died retired Ljubljana Archbishop Alojz Uran, who turns 75 years in January and in this year he would be celebrated gold Mass.
He was born in year 1945 in town Gameljne below Šmarna gora. After graduating from the Gymnasium Bežigrad, he first enrolled in the Faculty of Philosophy and after a year he went to the Theology of Ljubljana. In year 1970 he was ordained a priest and became chaplain in Ljubljana, after which he went to study for four years in Rome. After returning to Ljubljana, he ran a small seminary for three years, after which he became a pastor at Šentvid by Ljubljana.
On the 16th of December 1992 he was appointed to be auxiliary bishop of Ljubljana and on 6th of January 1993 he was consecrated to the bishop by the Pope St. John Paul II. As an auxiliary bishop, he also co-ordinated, among other things, a committee for the preparation of the Pope’s visit to Slovenia in year 1996 and at the Slovenian Bishop’s Conference he was in charge for Slovenians worldwide. In October 2004 he was appointed to be Archbishop and Metropolitan of Ljubljana until the year 2009, when he resigned.
After his retirement, he stayed at the St. Stanislav’s Institution. He was later forcibly removed to Trieste, because of some unexplained reasons. He devoted himself especially to pastoral and spiritual pilgrimage. Two years ago, Archbishop Uran gave an interview for magazine Demokracija. “It is unfortunate that in the post-war period the Christian side was heavily stamped as negative, both in history and in the present. And if one continually spits on Christianity, it also affects people’s consciousness.
When I met with members of other nations, I saw that they had much more respect of the priest, the bishop, the Church, the ritual itself. In our country, however, this is somehow reduced to banality, just as maternity was recently re-devalued with the help of a torn flag. It’s like having a baby is a sin, something bad,”Archbishop Uran also said at that time.
Prime Minister Janez Janša also expressed his condolences on his death, who also said, in a telephone conversation with the Archbishop of Ljubljana Stanislav Zore, that Uran was one of the important building blocks of the Church in Slovenia, with his example, openness and tireless will. “The Catholic community has lost a devoted pastor, who has acted for the good of the Slovenian nation, through his actions,” also said the Prime Minister.